GDB XVII: Lazy Sunday

You guessed it, Nationeers. It’s lazy Sunday. That means today, I’m not even thinking about hockey. But who can blame me? The last seven games have been a difficult pill to swallow — with a record of 4-6-0 in the last ten— and although many people warned me, including several Nation writers, I still wasn’t prepared for the thoroughly average to below-average play displayed by this team so far this season. Because I’m an overly optimistic team booster with an ecstasy problem.

We’ve logged a total of 16 games. Inspiration and grit seemed to be the name of the game when the season launched. Penner showed us he was more than an over-paid garburator, Comrie pulled a heck of a comeback to a city that once loathed him, and even Khabibulin literally pulled out all the stops.

And then the Oilers of yore showed up. The kind that can’t stick passes, can’t put the puck on net, and rely on an old sack of bones of a goalie to pull them through the worst of times.

Don’t get me wrong, there’s a tinge of hope settled into the back of my mind. That somehow Pat Quinn and Tom Renney will find a way to horsewhip this crew of layabouts into a winning hockey team, especially against a team our own Jonathan Willis has said shouldn’t be this good.

I’m not overly optimistic about tonight, though — I still expect the Oil will lose on this lazy Sunday, just because that seems to be the name of the game these days — but I’d also settle for a 2-1 win. In regulation.

It was really easy being an Oiler fan here like two weeks ago.. remember when we were 6-2-1? And the leafs were waiting for their first win? It was such a good time here to finally get to stick it to those retarded leaf fans for years of having to watch them suck it up on HNIC…

"Thomas Kaberle was talking to Darryl Sittler Kaberle asked him "What do you miss most about playing hockey?" Sittler replied " Probably the playoffs. Kaberle responded " I know what you mean".

NOW don't anybody remind me about our own issues with missing the playoffs, I am making fun of the leaf right now.

And yeah, tell me about it. I'm getting it so hard from all angles. It's brutal. Both my dad and one of my best friends are Leafs fans so I haven't heard the end of it for the last few days. Combine that with constant beaking from Canuck fans and my feelings are starting to get slightly dented.

But I'd rather take it out here than be stuck right in the epicenter of Leafs Nation. I don't think I could handle that.

Somebody told me once about a place in Toronto where Oil fans gathered fairly regularly, but I wasn't living here at the time, didn't know the city very well, and wasn't paying enough attention. As always, hindsight is 20/20 (or at least 18/20).

One thing about the current injury, flu streak, the oilers will have no excuse for over or underestimating the players on the farm team, soon enough they all will have played on the big team this season.

You know, there were years we fans just craved to see the players on the farm team, 99 and co. being so boring by not winning ever game by 6 or 7 goals and even daring to lose a game or two some weeks. Now it seems we see too much of the farm team. Oh, well, that's hockey. GOOILERS!!!!

Y'know, Reddox playing might not be the worst thing for our heroes. All last year he chased pucks into the corners relentlessly, and that's exactly what the Oilers have been missing since they started this slide.